August 25, 2010

• It’s me again…

  I am terrible these days, about blogging here on Xanga. I have become addicted to Facebook. It’s easier to communicate there.
  
  There’s just so much going on in my life right now, and it seems that not only do I not have time to blog, I really don’t even care anymore. We spent 3 months in and out of hospitals with my mom earlier in the year when she had bypass surgery, and then setbacks afterward.
  
  Then July 8, Bethany had surgery again. Three years ago, she ruptured a tendon in her left ankle. She had surgery on it 2 years and almost 4 months ago. The recovery was long and grueling. The doctor, in order to make her unstable ankle more stable, broke the heel bone and shifted it 20 degrees, and put a screw in it. He stabilized the rest of the ankle by drilling a hole in the bone and running half the tendon through the ankle bone, to tighten it down like a zip tie. She was in a soft cast 2 weeks, and a hard cast for 4 more (I think…it’s hard to remember now). After the hard cast was removed, and she started therapy, the fracture in her heel re-fractured. Back in the cast.
  
  So earlier this year she began to have pain again. The doctor did an MRI and discovered a small, benign tumor (called an intraosseous lipoma) in a bone in the ankle. We thought that was what was causing the pain. If the lipoma grows (which it was) it can cause pain when it gets close to shattering the bone. So surgery was scheduled.
  
  After the surgery, Dr. Moss came out to tell us that he found, in his words, a nasty tear in the same tendon. We don’t know for sure how she injured it again. It could have been the day she slipped on the stairs. He said it would not take much. He did not remove the tumor because he would have had to drill into the bone again, and he did not believe that was causing her pain. He was right…her pain got better after the initial surgical pain was over.
  
  She’s going for therapy twice a week now. She will be going back to work September 8. But we found out her insurance would not pay for therapy this time. She has a $1000 cap for therapy, and some chiropractic care she had a few months back, counted toward that. So the doctor’s office does there own therapy for much less than the therapy place she went to last time.
  
  We are getting ready for our church’s 115 year homecoming on October 10. That means we have lots of sprucing up to do at the church. We’ve rebuilt a walkway cover that was blown away by Hurricane Ike in 2008. We’ve completely repainted and redecorated the fellowship hall. We are still working on it, but it’s coming along. We still have to repair some flooring in it, too.
  
  We “built” a new church library. We had an old office that was being used for a junk storage room. We completely cleared it out, painted, put down new flooring, added bookshelves, and added comfortable furniture. We also ripped up carpet in the secretary’s office and put down new flooring. We’ve added new lighting and ceiling fans.
  
  We have also redone some flowerbeds in the front. They look so much better. Our friend, Karen, put in many hours on that. She is now working on redecorating our older ladies’ Sunday School classroom. It was long overdue.
  
  Starting in September, we are painting the outsides of buildings and repairing siding.
  
  Two weeks after the homecoming, on October 23, Nita is getting married. Nita is 85, but you would never know it. This is certainly not her first wedding (she’s a widow and has been married twice), but she never had a wedding. So I am doing her wedding: making her dress, cake, flowers, and doing the decorating. It’s going to be beautiful, if I say so myself It’s a lavender wedding.
  
  After this is all over, I just want to do absolutely nothing for a while. But you know that’s not really a possibility. October 31 is our Fall Fest. Then November is Thanksgiving. We’ll have a church Thanksgiving dinner a week or so before Thanksgiving. Then, of course, December is Christmas.
  
  I need to go ahead soon, and have my other knee replaced. It has gotten so painful that it hurts every time I take a step. October will be 2 years since the other knee replacement.
  
  Brandon now has Crohn’s Disease. Google it if you don’t know what it is. He first developed ulcerative colitis at 14, but it has progressed to Crohn’s. He may have to go on immunosuppressant drugs soon. If it’s not one thing it’s another. Brandon will be 29 in November.
  
  On June 2, my cousin died of cancer. He would have been 50 this past Sunday. He battled cancer 5 times since he was 21, but he went on to get married and have 3 children. They miss him very much, as do his parents, brother and sister. He spent his last week in a hospice, but he said God would get the glory from this somehow. That in itself is an amazing testimony. We’ll see him again. Maybe sooner than we think.

  Last November, Beth was robbed at the Credit Union twice in 9 days. Well, Monday, there was a bank robbery in northwest Houston. The bank robber jumped the fence into the power plant where Steve was working, and they were on lock-down for several hours. I know…my family attracts the crazies.

  I’ve changed my background picture to one taken in October 2004, when we had a welcome home party for Ethan. It makes me think of fall, and I am ready for it. We’ve had heat advisories for the last 11 days. Sunday afternoon it was 102, with a heat index of 109. I know…not nearly as hot as it gets in Iraq, but still pretty warm. I’m ready for cool weather.
  
  I’m adding a few pics of our church repairs and flowers for Nita’s wedding. Click on them to make them larger. You’ll just have to look at some of them sideways. They are straight on the computer, but when they uploaded to Xanga, they were sideways. I don’t know if that can be fixed.
  
   
  
     
  
      

  And this is Bethany’s incision:

  

  I knew you’d want to see.
  
  

  • 2:42 AM
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